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The sound of fusion | 11/03/2016

If nuclear fusion were turned into music, it might sound something like this.

Continuum, the latest record by electronic musician Paul Jebanasam, takes its inspiration from JET, the European tokamak experiment hosted at CCFE. Paul's soundscape alternates between quiet ambient spells and crackling bursts of energy in much the same way as the fusion plasma swirling around the inside of JET at 200 million degrees Celsius. Appropriately, then, a photo of JET appears on the album cover.

Paul told us how the idea came about:

“There is something extremely poetic about the explorations going on in projects like JET and the purpose of the piece is partly to reflect on this. These scientific research projects represent the height of human technological achievement and I think there is something very interesting there.

“The title Continuum refers to the seemingly infinite processes unfolding within the universe we observe. The aesthetic of the music – particularly the use of electronics – is an attempt to depict the almost unimaginable worlds explored by the concepts in modern physics.

“The use of the JET image for the artwork hopefully allows people a way into these ideas to explore them further."

Continuum was released in February and has already attracted some excellent reviews – to find out more see the Subtext Recordings website.